Then, I pressed the J-Pack button on the chest strap.

  Nothing.

  I pressed again.

  Nothing.

  I pressed three times.

  Nothing, nothing, nothing.

  Had the rain damaged the mechanism?

  I pressed one more time.

  Nothing.

  Then the pack fired by itself, unexpectedly, randomly, violently. It flung me upwards and away from the building and the street, but in the wrong direction, toward the side of one of the shorter buildings nearby.

  I put out my arms and legs, like a cat flung up in the air. I hit the side of the building just below the roof line, right into the dark blue glass window. Bang! The pack and rifle swung around on my back and clattered into the window after me. The bill of my helmet smacked into the glass. I saw a woman at a desk literally jump out of her seat.

  Then I bounced off. Too fast and too far to get my fingers into the gaps between the glass panels. I was falling again with fifty, sixty or seventy floors to the street below.

  Or just a few seconds of falling before impact.

  The street rushed up at me I clicked the J-Pack button over and over, hoping it would fire. Nothing.

  I looked down at the glistening street. There was a traffic jam. The cars roofs were slick with rain.

  At least I would hit those and not any civilians--except the people in the car. I hoped there might only be one.

  But suddenly I was stopped in mid air. At first, I thought I'd snagged my uniform on a pole or a gantry sticking out from the building's side.

  Then I realized it was something else. Something strong. Something with a very long reach.

  I hung suspended in the air with the rain drops falling either side of me. Then, I was lifted up and flung high over the building's edge. I landed in a heap and skidded along the wet concrete.

  I looked up. Ten feet away from me in the hammering rain stood Octavia.

  'Hello, Alex,' she said. 'You weren't trying to avoid me, were you?'

  I stood up performing a quick inventory. A welt was forming on one side of my forehead. My shoulder felt like it had been wrenched from its socket. Ankles, feet both seemed OK. My knee throbbed--the wound from yesterday.

  I straightened up and brought myself up to my full height. I shifted my shoulders to settle the J-pack and the rifle.

  'The Accord knows what you're planning,' I said. 'They're mobilizing the armed forces.'

  The falling rain made Octavia appear all the more magnificent. It streamed down the blue uniform, from her high collar right down to where her glistening legs disappeared into combat boots.

  She stared at me through her cerulean eyes, full of anger, full of certainty, full of coquetry.

  'The armed forces?' she said.

  'All three branches,' I replied. '

  'Well, that seems strange,' she said. 'Just yesterday, I accepted their invitation to attend your Establishment Day ceremony. It's starting soon Alex. Over there,' she said. 'By the harbor's edge--a fittingly dramatic location.'

  'They're deceiving you. They have the forces ready.'

  She took a step towards me. Each leg swung forward and inwards, her hips swaying.

  'We both know they don't, Alex, but you made a good try. They're just as naive as ever. They're welcoming us, as you knew they would.'

  She came closer.

  'Stay back, Admiral,' I said.

  'You went to see him, didn't you?'

  'It was just a dream.'

  'What did he tell you, Alex?'

  'Nothing that I haven't already discovered for myself.'

  She was now just a few yards away. She stopped, looked at me, smiling.

  'Don't worry, Alex,' she said. 'I'm not going to hurt you.'

  'I'm not worried.'

  'Oh, but I know you are, Alex. You know what's about to happen.'

  'Do I?'

  As fast as I could, I reached up and unslung rifle, bringing it around and down. But I was too slow. Octavia crossed the remaining distance between us before I could even bring the muzzle level.

  She knocked the weapon aside, grabbed me by the throat and raised me off the roof and up, into the rain. My flailing arms couldn't reach her, my kicks didn't hurt her.

  She smiled and tightened her grip.

  50

  'IF I PUT you down, Alex, will you behave?'

  She kept up the pressure on my throat.

  'Blink twice for yes and once for no.'

  I kept thrashing, trying to escape her grip.

  'I don't see you blinking Alex.'

  I blinked twice.

  'Was that a real blink or was it just because of the rain?'

  I blinked twice again.

  'Good,' said Octavia. She lowered me to the roof and released her grip on my throat.

  I tried to keep standing up straight as I drew a deep breath.

  'You are more aggressive than your ancestor. He never fired a weapon at me, never tried to kill me. But you did, Alex.'

  I said nothing.

  'I like that,' said Octavia.

  'You are lucky I missed.'

  'Am I? You think you can kill me?' She laughed. 'Once you get to know me Alex, you'll be amazed at what I can do.'

  'I've seen enough.'

  'Are you sure? The best is yet to come.'

  'What did you to Le Seaux?' I said.

  'Your short-haired, thin-lipped friend?'

  'Is she safe?'

  'It's more the case that she's repaired. We healed her after that blast.'

  'And she's co-operating with you without coercion?'

  'There's no need to coerce anyone who is a true believer in your Accord. She will be talking about equality and tolerance right up until her throat is cut by one of my Marines. Anything to avoid being called a name. Transphobic--was it, or other-ist? They're some of the words she used. I don't think I've seen anyone so able to deny reality--unless she was just acting. Could she have been acting, Alex?'

  'What about my mother?'

  'You saw the beam, Alex.'

  'And Chen?'

  'Ask your superior officers in the Navy. They'll tell you.'

  I shook my head. 'You might have noticed that most people of the Accord are no longer my friends.'

  'Were they ever your friends?' said Octavia. 'To me, they appear to be greater enemies than I am--but you know that now, right?'

  I said nothing.

  'You might be able to say I revealed the truth to you, up there on Excidium.'

  Lightning flashed on the on the other side of the harbor. Seconds later, thunder rumbled through the skyscrapers. The rain beat harder, actually bouncing upward from the rooftop.

  'You don't need to explain it to me,' I said.

  'Oh, was I woman-splaining?' she laughed.

  'When's the invasion?'

  'Invasion? Who said anything about invasion?'

  'You did.'

  'But we don't need to invade, Alex. Your Accord Commissioners have invited us here to stay. They're allocating territory for us, somewhere in the east of AONT Russia. Imagine that!'

  'But you want the rest of the planet.'

  'In time.'

  'Which time?'

  'The right time.'

  'When's the right time?'

  'Alex, you are so impolite now that you aren't in the Navy.'

  'Politeness is for people who aren't invaders.'

  She smiled.

  'You're the only one who thinks we're invaders, Alex. Doesn't that make you feel foolish?'

  'Not when it's the truth. I've had a lifetime of lies. The truth is harder, but it's better.'

  'What are you going to do with the truth, Alex? What did you think you were going to do after you ran from Excidium--which I allowed, by the way? And what did you intend with your mad dash across the sea and the great blasts of your rifle--or should I say, our rifle? You don't actually have a plan at all, do you? That's why you stayed an extra day on his ship, isn't it? But you don't have a plan. You'll just take things one step at a time. Is that how you say it?'

  I didn't reply.

  'You're just one guy, Alex. A very handsome guy, but you're just one man, one Earth man. It's not worth the trouble of trying to prevent the inevitable. And think about this, Alex.' She stepped closer. 'We won't be any worse than the government you have now. We might even be better. You've heard of the Pax Romana. It will be something like that.'

  Her cerulean eyes were on mine. She put her arms around my neck, apparently unconcerned about the weapon slung over my back. I pulled one her arms away, but like lightening, her hand was back at my throat again, and she lifted me up into the rain once more.

  'I don't want to kill you Alex,' she said.

  I couldn't reply.

  She lowered my down till we were level. She brought her lips to my ear.

  'Just this once, Alex. That's all I want. Just this once.'

  She brought her lips to mine. 'I let you cause me so much trouble for this.' Then she closed her eyes. 'Don't resist, Alex. It will be more pleasant than you think. Trust me.'

  'Fugitive Burns,' said the voice in my helmet.

  Before the voice could continue, Octavia raised a hand to the helmet, severing the strap and casting it off with one movement. The helmet dropped to the concrete beside us.

  And then we were kissing in the rain like film stars. Everything was like an Accord romance movie: the city, the storm, the island in the distance with its crowded skyscrapers, the people on the street below, sheltering under umbrellas, and the two stars kissing in the rain. The only things different were that Octavia was dressed like a pre-Accord fantasy figure, and that we were apparently of different genders.

  'See?' Octavia breathed. 'Nice.'

  Soon her uniform was unbuttoned. I was amazed at the sensuousness of Octavia's figure, as if she were a statue come to life. She was beyond perfection, honed and sculpted. In the Accord we were taught it was an example of patriarchy to desire bodies to be like Octavia's. It was necessary to like larger people--of any gender.

  But the touch of Octavia's body was enough to make me forget all sense of duty of anything, as if I was being drugged.

  'I know your secret,' she whispered.

  'What's that?'

  'You have never been with a woman, have you, Alex?'

  She hooked one impossibly long leg over my hip and drew me closer, rifle, J-Pack and all.

  The rain thundered down against my back and ran down my legs. I hardly noticed it. Octavia writhed and swooned. She raved in her language. She bit my shoulder. She growled again.

  'Lieutenant Burns,' said the tiny voice from down at my feet. 'Lieutenant Burns.'

  Octavia had reached some state of ecstasy. She threw her head back. She squeezed until I felt a rib crack. 'Alex,' she said through deep breaths.

  Then she breathed heavily into my ear.

  'I never want this to end,' she said.

  I sensed a change in Octavia's form. It was just the slightest adjustment of her body. It was still slippery and firm, but now it was harder, not flesh, her skin no longer pneumatic. It felt differently, almost brittle. Her forearm was sharper than I remembered; it had an edge. And her scent, so feminine, so seductive, now turned sour.

  I opened my eyes and began to speak, but the pincer was on my neck.

  'Shhhhh,' said Octavia. 'Don't worry, Alex. Hundreds of thousands of us are coming. But you won't have to worry about what happens. You'll be with me.'

  The pincer grip tightened. I brought my arms to try and unlock it from my neck, but they were as immovable as the blocks on a vice.

  'Shhhh,' said Octavia.

  'Lieutenant Burns?' said tiny the voice, somewhere in the rain.

  Octavia's grip tightened. I had escaped all kinds of holds in training. Even holds where your opponent has you in the worst possible disadvantage: headlock, arm lock, sitting on you, sleeper holds--you name it, but there was no getting out of this.

  And the grip was becoming tighter by the second.

  But then I had an idea--a last desperate idea.

  The rifle had slipped off my shoulders and was now slung around my waist. The muzzle pointed to my right. I reached my hand behind my back and grabbed hold of the stock. Then I pulled it slowly around, trying not to alert Octavia. I closed my eyes as if I were slowly asphyxiating. My finger located the trigger guard.

  'Won't be long now, Alex.'

  I tried to force the muzzle around so that it pointed at Octavia but it was too far. The best I could do was angle the rifle at the concrete beneath us. Maybe the blast might hit Octavia. The best might be it would fling me out of her grip. Or break my neck. Or destroy my legs. Or kill me.

  Too late to choose. I was passing out.

  I pulled the trigger, and hoped.

  There was an almighty boom and the rifle flung my arm violently outward, wrenching my shoulder properly this time. Concrete and dust blasted into the air, mixing with the rain. Octavia and I were thrown to the side, breaking her lock on my neck.

  As soon as I landed I reached for the rifle. I grabbed it with my left hand and swung it at her face.

  For the briefest of seconds, we looked at each other. Alarms were going off down in the building. Bells, sirens, some kind of announcement over a loudspeaker. Octavia's expression changed from surprise to pure anger.

  I pulled the trigger one more time.

  The rifle boomed. But this time the boom was not followed by concrete shattering. It was the sound of a large object crashing into mud, like an almighty slap.

  And it was followed by an ear-splitting howl--one that I'd heard before.

  'Ahhhh-woooooo!'

  But I only heard it briefly.

  The blast flung me over to the edge of the building. I caught a glimpse of Octavia as I fell. What I saw was not Octavia the beautiful woman with a hairstyle from Beauties From The Biggest Sitcoms Of The 1960s.

  It was the other kind.

  51

  AS I FELL, my unbuttoned uniform flapped in my face. I plummeted alongside the raindrops down towards a busy street in Kowloon.

  A person falling from a building accelerates down at thirty-two per feet per second per second. They reach a terminal velocity of one hundred and twenty-two miles per hour.

  Not good odds for survival.

  I knew enough from the short Navy training on jumping from sinking ships what would happen when my body hit the street. On impact, my legs would telescope up through my body, meeting my organs which would still be on their way down, followed by my head. If I landed on my side, there would be a different effect. My ribs would hit the street first, the organs would crash into those followed by the rest of my ribcage crashing into them. My head, making its own way down would slam directly onto the street, or the taxi roof, or the building awning, or an unfortunate person.

  But I wasn't planning on letting any of that happen.

  Five seconds to go.

  I swung my legs so that I was falling feet first. With my left hand I pulled at up my uniform until I found the broken J-Pack button. Two seconds to go. The street and the taxis roofs raced up at me. With about fifty yards to go, I pressed the J-Pack button.

  Just as before, it took several clicks of the button to get it to fire. When it finally responded, I was thrown up and to the right. My right shoulder slammed into the side of a glass building just above street level, no doubt startling yet another office worker. Then I bounced off the window and down into the street, but not actually onto the hard concrete or the blacktop. I landed on the heads and shoulders a crowd of people trying to get out of the way, but blocked by the crowd.

  I was in civilian territory.

  The force of my landing had been enough to knock some of the people down. Two men and a woman were on the sidewalk with their twisted and torn umbrellas. I got unsteadily to my feet, nursing my shoulder. It worked, but felt loose in the socket.

  'Sorry,' I said left and right. 'Sorry.'

  Other people were kneeling beside the fallen. I reached out a hand to one woman whose umbrella had been crushed. She shriveled at the sight of me, and yelling something in Chinese.

  On the rest of the street, there was mayhem. People scattered, dodging through the jammed traffic. Car alarms from parked cars shrieked. Drivers craned their necks.

  Mayhem.

  As more people beside me came to their senses, they singled me out--the foreigner in the blue military uniform, the one who stood out amongst the Establishment Day smocks and other formal clothes.

  'Get the police,' someone shouted. Then, other people started shouting other phrases in Chinese, which I couldn't understand. The chaos grew worse. More car alarms, rain, confusion, shouting, broken glass, injured people crying.

  And somewhere high above, Octavia was probably looking down on the scene, apoplectic with anger, reforming herself from the beautiful fantasy woman into something unimaginable.

  But there was no time to think about Octavia.

  Several hands grabbed my waist, my arms, my J-Pack. Someone kicked me. Someone else put their hands around my neck from behind, pulling me down.

  Time to get out--if I could.

  I raised the alien rifle and aimed at a building on the other side of the street. Before I could pull the trigger, a man grabbed the muzzle and yanked on it. I punched him away with a jab to his throat. Then, I quickly raised the muzzle again and shot off a pulse. The windows shattered halfway up the building's side. People at their desks were exposed, holding their faces. It was like throwing back a shower curtain.

  The blast had thrown me backward too, out of the clutches of the people trying to subdue me. I turned and ran, limping with the latest injury: a rolled ankle from the crash landing.

  I rushed through the crowd, shoving people out of the way, hard on the men, as gentle as possible on the women. I was being sexist, or at least the Accord's definition of sexist. I didn't care. I had to get out of that scene and away from Octavia's view of me.

  As I ran, a plan was forming--a very rough plan.

  One step at a time.

 

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